MAIL ONLINE: France's hardline immigration minister has launched a fresh demand to ban the burkha - decribed by president Nicolas Sarkozy a sign of 'subservience and debasement'.
Eric Besson said the Islamic full head and body covers were 'unacceptable' and not welcome in France.
His demand for a total ban comes after 58 French MPs called last June for a public inquiry on whether it should be illegal for women to hide their faces in public.
Mr Sazkozy backed the move, saying at the time: 'This garment makes women prisoners and deprives them of their identity.
'I say solemnly that they are not welcome on the territory of the French Republic.'
Women's rights groups and Left-wing MPs went even further, descibing the item as a 'walking coffin' and and a 'mobile prison'.
A burkha refers to a full-body covering worn largely in Afghanistan with only a mesh screen over the eyes, while a niqab is a full-body veil, often in black, with slits for the eyes.
France - home to Europe's largest five million Muslim population - already passed a law in 2004 forbidding students and staff from wearing veils and other religious symbols in schools as part of a drive to defend secularism.
Earlier this year Mr Besson said he though [sic] a law banning burkhas and niqabs would only 'create tensions'.
But he has now said he wants Islamic garments which cover the face - worn by an estimated 2,000 women in France - outlawed everywhere.
He said yesterday: 'I recognise that my views have now evolved.
'The burkha is unacceptable and contrary to the principles of national identity, of sexual equality and of the French Republic.' >>> Ian Sparks | Monday, September 14, 2009
